The sisterhood of the missionary mothers

A while ago my doorbell rang and it was two missionaries!  That does not happen around here too often.  They were Spanish speaking missionaries and wondered if I knew anyone who spoke Spanish.  I thought of one person.

I can't help it, I feel motherly toward missionaries.  They remind me so much of my own boy.  We chatted a minute (they were native English speakers--I didn't suddenly have the gift of tongues) and I found out where they were from (New Jersey and Florida).  I told them about Braeden (of course I did) and they told me how long they'd been serving (17 and 18 months).  I told them Braeden had been gone for 9 months and one of them said, "That's a long time."  Which was kind.  They understand about mothers.

Before they left, one of them earnestly asked, "Is there anything we can do for you?"

I started to say no but then I looked down at my cell phone in my hand (I had been on the phone with Enoch when they came).  I said, "Can I take your pictures and text them to your moms?"

They chuckled a little but readily agreed.  We debated about a background.  One thought the lake was a good backdrop, the other thought the mountains were.  I said, "You have lots of water in New Jersey and Florida but you don't have mountains like this.  Let's do the mountains."

It turned out there was too much back light for either picture so we had to opt for a more generic background instead.

One rattled off his mom's number and the other one had to look it up which I thought was adorable.  He probably just used to push the Mom button whenever he called or texted his mother.  I heard back immediately from their mothers.  Big thank yous with lots of exclamation points.   I so understand.  We texted back and forth.  I told them about Braeden (of course I did).  One of them mentioned tropical storm Bonnie on the East Coast then quickly assured me that the missionaries were going to be taken care of.  I felt an immediate bond to these two women who I'll never meet.  We have sons far away from home. We miss them and are thrilled to see a picture.

I was wondering later why the missionaries stopped at our house in the first place.  We're not on the way to anywhere and it seemed random that they would choose our house.  Then I thought maybe their mothers needed to see their faces.  It occurred to me to text the pictures because so many others have done the same for me.  We're all in this together.

You could probably power a city if you harnessed the missionary mothers' love and prayers.